Abstract
Doña Oliva Sabuco is the published name of the author of New Philosophy, a book on medicine and philosophy first published in Madrid, Spain, in 1587. I approach with caution the long history of disputation over its authorship, over whether it was written by Oliva or by her father Miguel Sabuco. I follow in the footsteps of two Oliva scholars and consider the possibility that the book speaks from a woman’s perspective. In a dialogic, and, at times, combative story-telling style, New Philosophy challenges established Galenic and Aristotelian androcentric conceptions of the relation between body and soul. It also defends a senequist stoic and anthropocentric view of affects or emotions. The book claims that affects have a physiological-moral function, to the effect that good equates with health and illness with bad or evil. I suggest these claims constitute a theory of embodied affects. I conclude that the medical or philosophical relevance of New Philosophy must be examined from an ethical perspective, and that the disputation over its authorship must be considered from this perspective also.
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Notes
- 1.
For a fine discussion of ancient theories of the human soul in Oliva’s time, see Marlen Bidwell-Steiner, “Metabolisms of the Soul”, 2012.
- 2.
I leave for another occasion the question of whether Oliva’s claim of organic inseparability carries any justified formal beliefs about metaphysical indistinctiveness, and whether this is a relevant question to ask of New Philosophy.
- 3.
Pomata (2010) discusses el caso Sabuco at length, and the authorship dispute is likely to continue among scholars and historians. I find the archive or documental side of the dispute wanting if it aims to provide proof of authorship. The documental evidence is arguably a product of the androcentric and Inquisitorial mores of the time. All concerned with such documents, not least the male Inquisition officers, notaries, fathers, husbands, brothers, and uncles, would routinely measure truth in relation to the lie that could preserve life or secure wealth. In my view, the quest for a proof of who wrote New Philosophy distracts us from furthering research on what medical and philosophical claims make New Philosophy a gynocentric work. In my view, Bidwell-Steiner (2012) makes an exemplary attempt in this direction.
- 4.
Acosta (1595) also mentions Oliva, or “Donna Oliua Sabuio”, at the end of his book in a list of Mugeres Sabias, Prudentes, Profetissas, Eloquentes, Secretas, Confiantes, Piadosas, Caritatiuas, Amorosas, Leales, Castas, Onestas, Virtuosas, Valerosas, Magnaminas, and Excellentis: De Que En Este Libro Se Haze Memoria [Women Who Are Wise, Prudent, Prophetic, Eloquent, Discreet, Trustworthy, Pious, Charitable, Loving, Loyal, Chaste, Honest, Virtuous, Corageous, Magnamic, and Excellent: Which This Book Remembers].
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Lopes, C. (2022). Oliva Sabuco on Embodied Affects. In: Lopes, C., Ribeiro Peixoto, K., Pricladnitzky, P. (eds) Latin American Perspectives on Women Philosophers in Modern History. Women in the History of Philosophy and Sciences, vol 13. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-00288-5_3
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